Helloooo? Trickster!
by Invader Kiwi
Summary: Clopin is more than human. He is the puppet master, the vagabond, the runaway, the trickster. Wait… what was that last one? (A collection of random short snippets and drabbles from the life and mind of the being currently known as Clopin Trouillefou.)


**Summary:** "Ding dong, the judge is dead, and everything's gone to plan!" Clopin is more than human. He is the puppet master, the vagabond, the runaway, the trickster. Wait… what was that last one? A collection of short snippets from the life and mind of the being currently known as Clopin Trouillefou. Technically a crossover with Supernatural. You probably don't need to know a thing about the show to understand, which is why this isn't in the Crossover section – I'm just borrowing someone, is all.  
(Yes, Supernatural fans. It is what you're thinking. Yes. I went there.)

**Disclaimer:** I own absolutely nothing. Well, nothing recognizable. My great-uncle invented the dumpster, though. Does that count?

* * *

**Chapter 1**  
**Hellfire – And Other Stories – Gargoyles – Origins – Horsing Around**

* * *

**Hellfire**

The Virgin Mary was paying absolutely no heed to the heartless judge who was currently pleading with a fireplace. And praying to her. Through song.

The being hereafter known as Clopin Trouillefou, on the other hand, was listening in rapt attention.

"You know I am a righteous man," the judge crooned.

_Ah, no,_ Clopin thought. _He hasn't been born yet and he's most certainly not you._

What… what was this guy _thinking_? Why was he _singing_? Clopin generally preferred not to know what went on behind people's closed doors – privacy existed for a reason, and he respected that. Sometimes. Besides, he'd walked in on some pretty nasty stuff before.

But… really? Singing to a fireplace?

The only reason he'd caught the prayer-turned-performance was because he had been paying close attention to Claude Frollo. The man was a monster, a menace, a malevolent Machiavellian madman and probably a number of other things that began with M and that he could come up with if he tried.

Hm. Machiavelli. Who was that again? Some Italian politician. Clopin wasn't sure why his named seemed to lend itself to a negative adjective. Perhaps he had just coined a term. It seemed appropriate; He had the nagging feeling that the man wouldn't be remembered for anything good in the future.

Neither, for that matter, would Frollo.

Clopin was sitting in his tent, amidst his gypsy subjects, in the relative safety of their underground hideaway. The judge was standing in a very large room, in front of a very large fireplace, singing about lust and murder. And this guy seriously thought he was a _holy_ man?

"Please either let me have sex with this heathen woman, or kill her." There. That basically summed it up.

Well, the man was already delusional, if he thought God was on his side for this one. But Clopin had plans for him. Frollo's puppet was actually one of his favorites – one the children always recognized, with a little hat and a big felt nose perfectly to scale. As a man, though, he didn't make a very good puppet. He was already being manipulated by someone other than Clopin, and though the gypsy king didn't play for his old team anymore, he knew the other side's influence when he saw it.

Frollo was not his puppet. But he was evil, and he was mad. And a little extra madness never hurt.

Clopin snapped his fingers. Frollo found himself running down a room lined with dozens of twenty-foot figures in red robes who provided a much-needed backup chorus to the judge's outlandish singing. He'd figure it was all a hallucination in the morning, anyway. In the meantime, he actually put on quite a good show, and Clopin was impressed – the madman could _sing_.

Ah, merde. Now the tune was stuck in his head.

* * *

**And Other Stories**

Before Paris, the being known as Clopin had never touched a puppet in his life.

Puppet shows had never simply been his thing, and if any of his brothers could see him acting out fairy tales for little children, they'd be laughing their heads off. But one day he'd given it a try, just for the fun of it… and hadn't stopped. He had to admit that they'd grown on him, and to be honest, he liked it. Putting a little life into each character, with a different voice and different mannerisms, telling a story. He loved the stories. Some days, he would tell the tales all the children knew, the tales that their mothers whispered to them at night. Some days, he would tell different stories, straight out of human history – kings and queens and armies and heroes. Mighty warriors, kingdoms rising and falling.

The children listened to these stories just as they did the more mundane fairy tales: with wide eyes and slightly open mouths, occasionally allowing a drop of drool to slip absently out.

He had a knack for this, it seemed.

But some days, the bells would ring loud for a celebration, a festival, a marriage, a death, and he would tell a story of a third kind. He would tell his stories, stories that his gypsies as a people didn't believe in, but that the bells did. The bells knew, and in the end, it wasn't the belief that mattered. It was the faith. His gypsies, his people, had faith in themselves and each other, not in the God that Notre Dame praised with each toll of its bells. It was refreshing. It was liberating. It was a freedom that he needed and longed for.

But when the bells rang for God, he would tell the children stories of a time before kings, before wars and warriors. He would tell them tales of the greatest warriors of all, tales stripped of their cold truths until they were right for children's ears. They were his family memories. And the kids loved it.

Have you heard the story of the first tree that ever grew, and the boy who fell out of it because he thought he could fly? His father gave him wings so he'd never fall again.

Have you ever heard of the four brothers who played tag in the clouds? They'd shout, "You're it!" so loudly you could hear it down here, with every roll of thunder.

Have you heard about the little boy who got lost in his backyard? When he found his way home, his family was so happy to see him that they threw a party that lasted a hundred years.

_ Have you heard? Did I tell you? Do you know?_

The children, he thought, knew there was something different about these stories. They weren't as well-loved as his fairy tales, weren't as grand as his histories. The puppets he used changed with each retelling, as if he couldn't decide what the characters were supposed to look like. But they listened in rapture nonetheless.

Sometimes even the adults would listen. But the story wasn't for them.

Children understood. Children could learn. He preferred the spontaneity of youth, the fun of childish antics and simple delights. That wasn't, of course, to say that he didn't appreciate the more… adult pleasures. Beautiful women were a major plus to the life he was living at the moment.

But the children loved his stories.

* * *

**Gargoyles**

The gargoyles… were not one of Clopin's best ideas. Frankly, he should have known better. The last time he'd brought stone statues of winged beings to life, they'd gone on a rampage of death and destruction and non-consensual time travel across the universe. He'd been meaning to fix that, actually.

But the gargoyles he'd decided on to keep Quasi company. Twenty years stuck in that tower, twenty years before that one Feast of Fools he'd had his eyes set upon, twenty years along the way. The boy would grow up mad. Or at least maladjusted. So Clopin infused a teensy bit of life into a few stone monsters, made sure they'd freeze whenever Frollo showed up, and… well. Again, it had seemed like a good idea.

Unfortunately, the gargoyles were complete idiots, and Clopin wasn't sure how Quasi had managed the last twenty years without going mad after all. They weren't people, they could never be people (well, they _could_, but the last time he'd tried _that_, Daddy had taken him aside and explained the finicky nature of souls to him – one little mistake in design and they go sociopathic) and having Quasi raised with them was only going to hurt him when he found out what humanity was really like.

They were flat characters. Clopin hated flat characters.

He wondered idly if it was possible to hang a creature made of stone.

* * *

**Origins**

His people knew he was Other, in the same way they knew he had black hair and a goatee. It wasn't something he advertised, and they didn't treat him with any particular awe or deference, other than what was due for a king. And he wasn't exactly a bow-down-or-thou-shalt-be-executed-for-heresy sort of king. In fact, the only way for an outsider to tell that he _was_ king was to realize that everyone happened to listen to him.

This, he decided, was just as appropriate for a storyteller as for a king.

At this point and after all this time, there was no particular reason for him to be king. He just was. And it so happened that he was the longest-reigning king that the gypsy population of Paris had ever had. This was not particularly surprising, since kings tended to die young and he'd been on the post for… what was it now? Almost thirty years, he supposed.

The man named Clopin Trouillefou had become king when the last king had decided to give up the job rather than risk his life running about in the old age of his mid-fifties. A king, to the gypsies, was a leader – someone who could rally them together and keep the peace. Someone charismatic.

He'd been watching these people for some time now, keeping an eye on them. He liked them. They were his sort of human beings – not afraid to have a little fun, and not content to be boxed up or restrained by life or law. His old pantheon had been fading for a while, and the beings he once called his equals, his counterparts (they weren't – not even close – but they didn't need to know that) had been struggling to survive on the faith of what few believers there were left.

But the gypsies. The _gypsies_. Heathens, yes – he'd always liked them best. They were so much more fun. And they needed a king. There was Clopin Trouillefou, young and full of life, bouncing around with boundless energy. There was Clopin Trouillefou, who thought he knew everything. There was Clopin Trouillefou, to whom the old king would teach all his tricks, impart all his knowledge.

It wasn't enough.

Because for all his energy, for all his knowledge, Trouillefou was not a leader. He was not a storyteller. No one would listen to him. The old king was beloved by his people – they did not want him to step down, they did not want this silly little boy (he can't have been more than eighteen at the time) taking his place. And Trouillefou was angry.

He had to prove himself. He would show them he had what it took. The old king had taught him, he knew what to do – he'd been raised in this life. He would steal something. Something special, something precious. From someone important.

The judge himself.

Frollo was wealthy – one of the wealthiest men in the city. Little Trouillefou was going to steal from his private vault, inside the Palace of Justice itself. No gypsy had ever gone in there by their own free will, or come out on their own terms. He would be the first.

Or he would have been, if he hadn't been captured, interrogated, flayed until the muscles of his back showed underneath the oozing, tattered remains of skin, and finally hung. It was a public event – Frollo had him marched up to the noose in a cloak of rags to conceal the physical evidence of his torture, but no cloak could hide the blankness, the nothingness in his eyes.

It had only been five days. He had not given away the location of the Court of Miracles. The judge didn't even know it existed – not yet – he wouldn't know for almost ten years. Clopin had spilled no secrets. He had told Frollo, a hundred times, that he would die first. And now he was going to. The executioner fussed with the noose, checking its strength, and though the boy struggled weakly to escape his bonds, there was none of the energy, the life, the charisma that he had had not even a week ago.

A part of Clopin Trouillefou was already dead. But he had not failed his people. He had not betrayed them. They would be safe – they would have a new king, a better king, a king who could save them from this madman who called himself a judge. They would have _justice_.

_"I can help you. It's alright; I'm a friend."_

The young king gasped and fell to his knees as a voice rang through his head. It was high and low and loud and soft and a thousand other things, like the most gentle of whispers and the most terrible of a lion's roars. The guards holding him hoisted him harshly back up, and the executioner moved to slip the noose around his neck.

"Who… _qui est-ce_?"

_"It's complicated. I'm sorry, kid. Look, I can save your life, but I need you – I need your consent. It won't be easy and it won't be pleasant and I'm sorry, but I can help. Please. Just say yes. Hurry."_

"I… I…" the boy stuttered. The executioner tightened the noose. Frollo stood by, gazing at the gypsy with obvious disdain. He had made a speech denouncing the city's population of vagabonds – this was the first public hanging of a gypsy criminal to occur under his jurisdiction, and he wanted to set an example.

"Any last words?" he drawled, almost hoping the vermin would dare to rebel so that he could accuse him of insolence one last time before death.

_"I can bring you justice."_

Clopin closed his eyes. "Yes."

Somewhere in the audience, a man collapsed dead on the ground. He had been a nondescript Scandinavian metalworker, born some few hundred years previously. But his body was no longer required.

To the gypsy boy, there was a flash of light, accompanied by the roaring of a lion and the screaming of an eagle and the chimes of every bell that had ever rung, with wind and motion and sheer _force_, like being chained to a living thunderstorm. And then it was over and he was floating in a sea of whiteness, alone, safe, cocooned by a warmth he hadn't felt since the womb.

_"Sleep. It'll be alright. Everything will be alright. I promise."_

It had taken only a second. The being that was now, for all intents and purposes, Clopin Trouillefou, looked up to answer the judge's question.

"Just a warning," he said, looking directly into the man's eyes. His own took on an eerie light, as if lit from within. "Claude Frollo, you are going to burn in Hell, and I'm almost sorry that I won't be coming down there to watch it. _Au revoir_."

And with that, the king of the gypsies disappeared in a flash of purple smoke.

The rest of the Court, over the next few weeks, became increasingly aware that there was something off about their new king. His vanishing act had drawn their attention and praise, but more than that, he had changed. The little boy acrobat with a penchant for tricks and games turned, seemingly overnight, into a sly, conniving, slippery little weasel. He was as hyper and cheerful as ever, but there was a dark tone to his words and a glint in his eye that was not there before.

He was also turning into a leader. Suddenly his voice, which had never seemed particularly outstanding or worth paying attention to, was rallying the gypsies of Paris together against their rising enemy. Judge Frollo would hear of the Court of Miracles someday, and someday he would find them. They had to be prepared.

So Clopin (because he might as well start getting used to the name – he was quite liking the whole French thing, actually) taught them a few tricks. Many of them were already well-versed in sleight of hand, and some were psychic. Fewer of the gypsies were actually involved in typical, deal-with-a-demon witchcraft than the Church would have the people believe, and he made sure to have a little chat with each of the ones who were. The disappearing act he'd used after the un-execution wasn't the sort of thing your average, run-of-the-mill human could do, but… well. He was their king and they were his subjects and he could do whatever he liked, thank you very much. So he taught them. A little smoke and mirrors, a little supernatural help. The guards still caught them sometimes and he couldn't save everyone, but for the most part, they were getting by.

And they knew.

They knew after one week when Clopin started flipping between a hyperactive puppeteer by day and a vengeful trickster by night. They knew after one month when someone noted that he hadn't lost a mite of his seemingly limitless energy – despite not sleeping for days on end and eating nothing but stolen glazed pastries, fondue, and _pain au chocolat_. They knew after the first year of bizarre miracles and casual defiance of every law of nature. They knew before the end of the first decade, at which point Clopin had decided to stop aging.

Their king was Other. But that was alright. He knew what he was doing, he kept them together, he made sure everyone had what they needed. He was a good king. And if he was Different, then it was a fact as plain as the little black beard on his face.

* * *

**Horsing Around**

_(Sleipnir is, in Norse mythology, the eight-legged horse son of Loki, the trickster god.)_

That horse of Phoebus'…

Clopin frowned and looked again.

That horse.

The beast looked up. Their eyes met. Two strangers on the street.

He'd seen the animal sit on command, tap out numbers on the ground, answer his rider's rhetorical questions with a sense of irony not found in dumb animals.

Clopin raised an eyebrow.

The horse flicked an ear. No. There was no possible way.

Clopin crossed his arms.

The horse tossed his head slightly. Really. It had been millennia. Of course there had to be some descendents, plenty of them, but surely after the interbreeding they wouldn't be…

Clopin huffed and tapped a foot impatiently.

The horse mimicked the gesture.

The gypsy king threw up his hands in exasperation and strode towards the horse, raising a finger and jabbing it towards the animal with each word. "You are smarter than you have a right to be, my four-legged friend."

The horse _winked_ at him.

"Right. Well." He was somewhat at a loss. "If… I don't suppose you know what happened to your… what would he be? Great-great-great-great-great-great…"

The horse – Achilles, he remembered the name was – started tapping on the grown with a hoof. He counted the beats. Seventeen.

"Right. Of course, you'd keep track. I don't suppose you would know what happened to your seventeen-times-great grandfather, then. Would you, _mon cher_?"

Achilles shifted his forelegs in what could only have been a shrug.

"Well, I… I haven't seen him in a very long time. So if you ever do see him, could you… could you tell him I said I'm sorry and could he please get his hairy tail back to the pantheon before Odin starts riding Fenrir instead?"

The horse started pointedly at the puppeteer.

"Oh, don't look at me like that. Just because I–"

"Excuse me?"

Clopin spun around to see the captain of the guard, Monsieur Sun God himself, staring at him with that look of righteous perplexity he'd last seen on David when Goliath had gotten off his stilts and been revealed to be four-foot-eight.

"Sorry," he said curtly. "Just having a chat with my... ah... eighteen-times-great grandson. Carry on." And he walked away, disappearing around a corner into a tiny pocket of oblivion.

* * *

**AN (justification):**

I… this… I don't even… *sigh*

Clopin has always had a rather mysterious, inhuman quality to me. In the book, he's just the king of gypsies. In the film, he obviously plays the same role, but at the same time, I find it hard to believe that he's… entirely a gypsy. He's a puppet master, and I can't help but get the feeling that it's not just his hand puppets that he's controlling. Not to mention the little things: those rapid-fire clothing changes in the Court of Miracles, some of the disappearing acts he and Esmeralda perform… in a Disney movie, physics isn't exactly a priority. But considering how realistic the rest of the movie was (completely ignoring the gargoyles), I think perhaps the laws of physics simply don't apply to him. (Also, he's the only character in the entire film, set in Paris, who has a French accent. Suspicious much?)

Therefore: He is a super-human manipulative bastard who plays with people's lives, enjoys killing people if it's funny and he thinks they deserve it, thinks being totally innocent is the "worst crime of all," likes to put on a show, clowns around, messes with reality, acts as a "lawyer and judge all in one," and ensures that everyone gets their just desserts in the end.

Wait. Wait a minute. I know someone else with that description.

So this happened.

Yes, Clopin is the Trickster. Also known as Loki. Also known as… well, you know. Yes, he is the reason Hellfire was as awesome as it was. Yes, he is the reason the gargoyles can move and talk, and yes, that was a Doctor Who reference. Yes, he created the weeping angels. Oops?


End file.
